Rick Haglund: Oakland County exec Brooks Patterson has stayed too long at the party

Oakland County Executive L. Brooks Patterson made negative comments about Detroit in a New Yorker profile that shows he's out of step with many Republicans who want to see a city resurgence.
((Tanya Moutzalias | MLive.com))

Oakland County Executive L. Brooks Patterson built a political career around demonizing the late Detroit Mayor Coleman Young, who was loathed by many of Patterson’s suburban constituents.

But after more than 20 years in office, Patterson has become Young—a savvy political operator who stayed too long at the party.

At a time when Gov. Rick Snyder and others in Patterson’s Republican Party are helping revitalize a bankrupt Detroit, Brooks has stepped up his verbal assault on Motown.

In a revealing New Yorker magazine story published last week, Patterson essentially said he hates the city where he grew up.

“Anytime I talk about Detroit, it will not be positive,” he said. “Therefore, I’m called a Detroit basher. The truth hurts, you know? Tough sh--.”

Patterson has spewed this stuff for decades, mainly because it plays so well among voters who have repeatedly installed him as the top elected official in Michigan’s wealthiest county.

I recently heard him deliver his shtick to a group of around 300 people in Birmingham who laughed and applauded as he wisecracked about Detroit’s decline.

The average age of that crowd appeared to be around Patterson’s 75 years. I wonder, though, how those jokes would have been received had the audience been filled with 20-somethings not hardened by regional divisiveness?

Maybe Patterson is dissing Detroit out of fear—fear that a resurgent Detroit will somehow diminish his county’s economy. With his crude, sometimes racist remarks, Patterson is suggesting Detroit must stay down for Oakland County to prosper.

After all, Oakland has profited from the massive shift of business and population out of Detroit into Southfield, Troy, Auburn Hills and other suburban communities.

But now Detroit has something Oakland County can’t offer: a large urban living and work experience that young adults increasingly desire.

Corporations such as Compuware and Quicken Loans have ditched the suburbs for the city in part to attract the young, talented workers they require.

Quicken Loans founder Dan Gilbert said his company received 19,000 applications from college students all over the country for 1,000 internships last summer in Detroit. Yes, Detroit.

What Patterson fails to recognize is that the most prosperous metro areas in the country, including Boston, Chicago and Minneapolis, are anchored by vibrant, large cities.

A shrewd political leader once put it this way:

“We can no longer afford the luxury of hatred and racial division. . . . What is good for those who live in the suburbs is good for those of us who live in the central city. It is clear we have a commonality of interests.”

Coleman Young spoke those words in his first inaugural address on Jan. 2, 1974. We are struggling to accept them 40 years later.